Lou Dobbs was on his latest tirade about the "illegals" crossing our borders to steal our jobs, infect us with leprosy, and clog our schools and hospitals. In an effort to ignore him, I started scrolling down the recent diary list till I came to this diary which positively sent a shiver down my spine.
It seems some folks would have us believe that TU status should be freely available to any commenter simply for the asking, without regard for those of us who have followed the rules, waited our turns, and diligently posted our least controversial or biggest suck-up comments to collect mojo.
While I understand that the vast mojority of of lapsed Trusted Users are rule abiding kossacks, I strongly disagree with the notion that existing or aspiring TUs are incapable of, or unwilling to post witty, incisive, or illuminating comments.
I fear that the resources of this site may be finite, and that an influx of new TUs could dilute the value of our verbosity and ultimately drive some of our most entertaining Trolls to other sites, while enticing and empowering the alert, malicious ones.
In creating these "sanctuary" diarys," where we freely allow those who have overstayed or never attained their TU status to milk our generosity for mojo, are we not risking a community overrun by pie eaters and puddy panderers?
Not that there's anything wrong with pies or cats, mind you.
Sure, in these mojo free-for-alls, they'll tell you they were on vacation, or away from their desks or even that they've been unfairly disadvantaged by some algorithm or something. I don't want to be too harsh on them, but the very unseemliness of begging for, and recieving mojo should tell you plenty about the changes I fear are threatening to overtake dKos.
I have nothing against these so-called "commenters," as a group. I realize that, for the most part, they have been driven to these drastic measures by circumstances beyond their control, and possibly even by a corrupt system.
I, myself have a relatively high UID, but I came here cause I was seeking a better virtual life and felt I had something real to contribute. I was willing to play by the rules and wait my turn.
As it turned out, I didn't have that much to contribute, but really felt a great sense of satisfaction and superiority when I first attained TU Status.
Hidden comments were like porn to me at first, but the purient nature of them soon dissipated, and even my seldom-used TR ability has lost much of its prestige because of all these potentially illegitimate TUs.
I frequently experience the devastating loss of TU status, so I am not unsympathetic to the plight of those who would resort to "pimping" and "whoring" (words I suspect are user-phobic) to beat the system.
I am in no way suggesting Markos do anything draconian, like building a firewall to keep these people out, but I think taking an honorable path to TU status would benefit us all.
Maybe I left Lou Dobbs on too long again, and just got all worked up over nothing.
The other possibility is that I'm a total prude, and should join in the fun.
So far I have managed to mask all my mojo-whoring in praise for my favorite candidate or bad puns.
But, that's more like flirting for mojo, isn't it?
How do you do it?